(Bern 1853-1918 Geneva)

Composition study for ‘The Battle of Morat’ II. 1917.

Pencil and Indian ink on paper.

20 × 29.5 cm (image). 26.2 × 37.8 cm (sheet).

rovenance:
- Collection of Ferdinand Wortmann, Basel.
- Kunsthandel Dr. Fritz Nathan and Dr. Peter Nathan, Zurich, June 1959 (label verso).
- Collection of Karl Steiner.
- Swiss private collection.

Literature:
Jura Brüschweiler and Rudolf Koella: Ferdinand Hodler. Sammlung Steiner, Zurich 1997, p. 114/115, 246, plate 43.


As with the drawing offered in Lot 3030, this is also a study for Hodler's composition for ‘The Battle of Morat’, which was planned as a mural in the armoury hall of the Swiss National Museum in Zurich but was never executed due to Hodler's health condition. The drawing shows a later compositional idea in which the fleeing cavalry of the Burgundian army no longer appear as a tumult of figures, but instead in a more abstracted and reduced form.